Thinking that properly raising children and investing in bettering oneself doesn't tangibly generate revenue is a bit short sighted.
In 15 years when machines are cheaper and better at driving, manufacturing, and doing most unskilled labor (or even some knowledge worker type jobs). Would it have been a bad economic investment to have all the kids growing up today have parents with the financial freedom to go back to school or focus on giving their kids a proper childhood (so they can grow up and be productive citizens)?
Do you genuinely think that we are better off as a society sticking to "you have to work to live" when the machines are outperforming an entire class of people at their jobs? Not everyone can or wants to be an engineer. At some point our populations will stabilize, and technology will make it so that we have enough food and basic essentials for everyone.
We are all in it together.
We have been printing money for quantitative easing, but it isn't released into circulation. The Fed sets short term interest rates directly, but once those hit zero, the only alternative is QE. QE uses Fed cash (printed if you will) to buy US Treasuries thereby increasing the demand for them and driving down long term interest rates. The goal is to avoid the contraction of credit and the deleveraging of the US economy. If that much cash was just dumped into circulation you would see inflation on a large scale.
As for the rest of it I'm going on opinion which you and I have no chance of agreeing on (which isn't the end of the world, everyone has their own opinion). Yes I think child care and self improvement are great in the long run, but it can be tricky to measure exactly how much they contribute directly to GDP (quantitative measurement). Yes I also think work to live is better for society. I think work helps people stay out of trouble and even when I was making next to nothing it felt good to make my own way.